November 10, 2006

Leinster 38 - 23 Glasgow Warriors

Celtic League match played at Donnybrook on Friday November 10th 2006 | 9 comments

JP went over for Glasgow's first tryGlasgow's recent run of wins was brought to an end tonight at Donnybrook, as Leinster eventually secured their 5 points.

In a wet and miserable Dublin, Leinster and Glasgow Warriors fought out a roller-coaster of a match in a tit-for-tat game which was only settled going into the final quarter after the lead had changed hands five times. Unfortunately for the Warriors, it was the home side that pulled away, finishing with two converted tries and putting the game out of reach for the visitors at 38-23.

The home side opened the scoring with a Rob Kearney penalty and added to that with their first try of the night. With the forwards driving over the line try, Fosi Pala’amo emerged from the pile of bodies with the ball and was credited with the touch down but Rob Kearney missed with the conversion.

Dan Parks opened Glasgow’s scoring with a penalty and followed it with another but it wasn’t long before Leinster hooker Brian Blaney added the side’s second try when the Glasgow defence let themselves down tracking a long kick ahead and Blaney was hand to dive on the ball in the scoring zone. Again though, the home side’s kicking was off target and Andy Dunne missed the conversion.

As half time loomed, the Warriors got straight back into the game when Dan Parks floated a long pass out wide for Jon Petrie to collect on the right hand side of the pitch and run in to score the try. Parks added the conversion and when Glasgow pinched the Leinster lineout a few minutes later, the visitors took full advantage of it by threading the ball quickly out to the left and sending flying winger Thom Evans over the whitewash. (Parks missed conversion)

With Glasgow going into the break in the lead, Leinster went out to claim the match back and with the second half only two minutes old, Ireland internationalist Denis Hickie notched up another try (but Kearney again missed the conversion) to take the hosts three points into the lead following a Kearney penalty just before the break.

There was no rest though as Glasgow’s Canadian internationalist Kevin Tkachuk took the lead for the Warriors with another try which had been recycling straight from the kick-off. (Parks missed conversion).

Robert Kearney added another penalty for Leinster and following a good strong passage of play from the home team, scrum half Chris Whitaker picked the ball from the back of the ruck and aimed for the line. Kearney added the conversion to take Leinster 31-23 into the lead just into the final quarter.

Home advantage and pressure told as the time ran out and Leinster sealed their victory with a Jamie Heaslip try and Andy Dunne conversion.

For the game to be so close throughout, the Warriors go into the Autumn break with the disappointment of no losing bonus from their Dublin visit, but the prospect of getting back into European action on their return to Hughenden in December.

Dreadful result against Leinster seconds. Didn't see the game but this just about sums up Glasgow's season-good against poor opposition ( Borders,Parma, Connacht) but when the going gets tough(Leinster seconds!!) it falls apart. The rest of the season is damage limitation-let's try to win home games & hope to finish above the Borders. On paper we had a strong team tonight-something is far wrong, either with the coaching or with the attitude of the players. The league statistics points for/against & tries for/against make grim reading. The stats show this Glasgow team are one of the poorest ever-which I don't believe-but after so many false dawns-we are running out of excuses. As a fervent supporter of many years, I don't know what the answer is-we have changed coaches over the last few years and changed squads, but the results don't improve. We had 9 internationalists on the park tonight & couldn't even get a bonus point. Totally depressing!!

Its simple. Unless things pick up its bye bye Sean Lamont. Thats if the people in charge have any guts eg to make hard decisions. There is one replacement head and shoulders above them all and that is Peter Wright.

The poor guy is probably in shock-but I'm not sure another change of coach is the answer-maybe all those years ago Kiwi Searancke was right-we just don't have the talent or the skill or the will to win-& he was sacked for saying it !! It's looking like Glasgow to finish second bottom in the league-& I'm an optimist!!

If none of you have seen the game then like me you have nothing relavent to say so stop bitching, but can i ask how often is it glasgow go away from home and score twenty points, we may have leaked forty but its a begining, at least we scored away from home. So how about we all just shut up and start getting behind the team instead of bitching. The supporters play just as big a role in this game as the players do and frankly after what i have read this week i am ashamed to be a glasgow supporter because we are just a load of bitch, bigots looking for arguments.

Come on you are clutching at straws, with the "scoring 20 points away from home" comment.

You do not have to have been to the game or watched the game to know that getting soundly beaten by a second string team simply isn't good enough. We have a team of professional losers.

What is the point in scoring 20 points if you are going to concede almost double that? The stats don't lie, we are awful! We have the worst points against record in the league, and Sean Lineen's record is markedly worse that Hugh Campbell's, and Hugh got the boot. I must admit that I was never convinced by Hugh Campbell, but maybe the guy was being dragged down by Lineen, after all Lineen's record is woeful, but he is one of the boys so he keeps his job, and so the cycle of poor results continues.

Totally agree. I've had bad feeling about Lineen's agenda even as an assistant to Campbell. To my undestanding (all be it outside the changeing room) he isn't very compitent at motivating players to believe in themselves and to play with confidence. His reverse psycology style of motivation, constlantly blasting players with how bad this or that decision was, clearly dosn't work. And after you hear how bad you are, over and over, you start believing it and play like a "professional loser".
Bottom line: He's out to promote himself. He dosn't back or believe in his players. Who's going to boost the confidence but the coach?

Hey two years ago everyone was gripping about lack of consistency - well you have consistency now - consistently poor.

It is not losing away to Leinster that bothers me it is the attitude at times. Even under Kiwi when Glasgow lost there was a sense that the players had given their all and were gutted to have lost. Now it just seems that they don't care.

There needs to be a change - starting with not losing another home game all season. A bit of belief that when a team comes to Hughenden then Glasgow will be favourites and will win no matter who the opposition is. From that will come the confidence to go away and win the games. It is no coincidence that Glasgow's best away win (Llanelli 2 years ago) came on the back of a long sequence of home wins.

We are not a bad team but lack that nastiness,streetwise and confidence that the Welsh and Irish teams seem to have.

Watched Edinburgh a couple of times this year and I think man for man they aren't much better than us but they have the belief.

Well, I was at the game and it was yet another game we should have won. We took the first ten minutes to settle but after that, Glasgow were on top for the rest of the first half. What happened to the forwards in the second half, not even they could answer. Leinster took over and, even though we regained the lead, you always felt the home side by then had the stranglehold up front to win the game. One bright note was another exceptional score by Thom Evans.